


Try For Them; Die For Them

by capturemeli



Category: Pitch Black (2000), The Chronicles of Riddick Series
Genre: Animal Transformation, Dimension Travel, Dog - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-12
Updated: 2018-08-19
Packaged: 2019-06-26 04:51:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15656127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/capturemeli/pseuds/capturemeli
Summary: She finds herself transported into the Pitch Black universe, completely transformed.





	1. Chapter 1

I was a dog.

A big, grey, wire-haired, long-legged dog.

In a desert.

With two suns.

Honestly, I think I was taking it better than most. Okay, so there had been the initial panic, and a lot of running aimlessly and howling – howling! – but I’d put myself back together. After a long sit in the too-hot sand, I stood up, picked a direction, and got moving. What else could I do? So, there I was, trotting through the sand on a never-ending pursuit of those two unnerving yellow suns.

The more I looked at them, the more those suns tugged at something in my memory – which was ridiculous. There was only one sun on earth, so why would two suns be familiar? Obviously, I wasn’t on earth anymore. Hell, maybe? It was hot enough, I mused. Did I die? The thought sent a terrified quiver through me. Anxiety increased my speed until I was flat-out running again. I hadn’t really died, right?

My ensuing panic attack was interrupted by the loudest crash of thunder I’d ever heard. Instinct stopped me dead in my tracks, had me crouching into the sand. But no, it wasn’t thunder. My heart pounded in my rib cage while I watched a ship come barreling down from the sky. A spaceship. Long and thin, it dropped at an alarming rate. It didn’t look good for whoever was piloting the thing.  
I felt sick when I saw pieces start to break off the back end of the ship. It really wasn’t looking good. Especially coming down at the angle that it was. But then the nose of the thing tilted forward, the ship gained some stability, and then it slammed into the sand.

Even from a mile off, the impact nearly bowled me over. It would have, if I hadn’t already been crouched as low as I could go. I was running again before the dust had settled. The wind and sand kicked up from the crash was whipping into my face, stinging my eyes and drying out my tongue. I couldn’t breathe but I kept running. Someone had to survive that crash. They had too. It was my only hope.

I wasn’t oblivious to my situation. Waking up as a dog aside, unless this was some never-ending hellish nightmare, I couldn’t survive in this heat indefinitely. Even if no one survived the crash, others would come to check it out; either from the surrounding desert, or from wherever that ship came from. There was some hope in that. And, maybe, someone somewhere could have some answers for me.

The ship had left a trail of debris miles long. I could see the heat waves coming off the warped metal and hear the pop-pop-pop of the wreck settling. The scent of ozone forced a sneeze from my sensitive nose. Nothing else moved or made a sound. I sniffed around the edges of the crash, zig-zagging a wary line closer. The main body of the ship was reasonably intact, though the back-most part of the last section was quite literally ripped off. I stepped carefully around the scattered shards of metal it had become. I didn’t want to burn or cut my feet – paws – whatever.

My sun-blind eyes couldn’t see into the dark interior of the ship so I moved closer. I lifted myself half up into the wreck, front paws on what must have been the wall or the ceiling of the interior before things got all jumbled up. Finally, I could get a good look at the inside of the ship. There were tubes and wires all along the walls, metal beams broken off like so many jagged teeth. And…were those glass coffins? No, not coffins. That memory tugged at me again. They were cryo pods, for deep space travel. How could I know that? I was trying to puzzle it out when I heard movement, getting closer, and then a shout. I was off like a shot before I could even question the impulse. I hid behind the plentiful debris, ducking down so my new canine body was out of sight.

I watched the ship for the next several minutes. I could hear the passengers moving about; shouts; the screech of metal and the shattering of glass. Some animal wariness kept me hidden and watching. I was glad I had hung back when I heard a man screaming in pain. What was going on in there? A moment later, the survivors came flooding out of the ship. That’s when it hit me. I knew those people. I knew this ship. I knew this desert planet. I even knew those damn double suns.

I’m not sure how much someone can take in one day, but I was sure I had reached my limit. I put my head to my paws and closed my eyes, tight. Here’s what I knew:

I was a dog.

A big, grey, wire-haired, long-legged dog.

And I’d somehow managed to end up in the movie Pitch Black.

I was, without a doubt, 100% screwed.


	2. Chapter 2

I don’t know how long I lay curled up in the sand. It was certainly long enough for a sort of calm to come over me, which a voice in the back of my mind whispered was probably not the best sign. But, heck, if it got me through the next moment, I was cool with it. When I finally lifted my head again, I saw a few of the survivors spread out around the crash – in the pitiful shade afforded by the wreck or on the top of the ship with their eyes scanning the horizon. How no one had stumbled upon me was a mystery. As I watched, Fry and Johns walked out of the ship and started gathering everyone up. They were asking if anyone had any food or water. Paris implied he had something tucked away. More specifically, he was pointing enthusiastically toward me. I ducked lower before realizing his attention was aimed at the sections of the ship that had come to rest just behind me. The entire party started making their way in my direction. I scooted back blindly only to bump into a sharp sheet of metal but, twisting around in pain, I realized it created a slight overhang. I didn’t know if there was enough space for this new body of mine, but I shoved into the tight space underneath with all my might.

I could hear the people coming: they were almost on top of me. I scooted around to make sure I was completely hidden – need to tuck in that tail! Then I went completely still.

I watched ten pairs of feet walk within a meter of me as I tried not to sneeze out all the sand I’d just inadvertently shoved my nose into. They passed quickly though, in their haste to get their hands on food or water. I could hear them all load themselves one by one into some cargo container. Then, when they were all gone, I sneezed and hit my head on the hot metal above me.

I quickly and not so cleanly extracted myself from my hiding place and shook out my fur. It felt so good that I did it once more, tongue lolling happily, before trotting my way toward the ship section I’d originally scoped out. This wasn’t going to be real to me until I saw him. I pointed my nose into the air, instinctively searching with my nose instead of my eyes. But what was I even searching for? I’d never scented him before, obviously. How weird would that be? Even so, my nose caught something interesting in the hot desert wind and I quickly followed, lifting myself into the belly of the beast, as it were. The interior was even tougher to negotiate than the wreckage outside. Thankful for my long legs, I wound my way through to follow that scent.

A dog’s interpretation of an ‘interesting’ smell was a bit horrifying. I followed my nose right to the fresh corpse of Owens, the late navigator of the Hunter Gratzner. I back-tracked and hurried off into another direction, entering a compartment that was completely torn open on one side to see him making his way out the other end at a fast clip. I couldn’t believe it. Richard B. Riddick. In the flesh. He must have just escaped – yes, that was the beam he’d been tied to in the middle of the room. I followed before he could vanish completely. The sun blinded me when I moved from beneath the shade of the ship and I thought I’d lost him for a moment. But, no, I could see him leaning against another section of the broken ship some thirty feet away. He was still blindfolded and gagged – what was the point of that horrible metal bit in his mouth? – but he was working diligently at his bonds with a cutting torch. It took him just a couple minutes to cut the handcuffs from around his wrists, and a quick moment to get out the bit. Then he was off, blindfold still around his eyes, heading toward the double sunset.

Oh. The sunset. That must mean…

I looked to the opposite horizon to see the blue sun just rising. I stopped to stare at the completely alien and awesome sight before remembering Riddick. Speaking of, where had he run off to? I left the shelter of the crash site, eyes searching the wide desert for a glimpse of the convict. Did the sand swallow him whole? He wasn’t anywhere. I trotted out farther and caught sight of something glinting in the orange light. The handcuffs. Of course! Swinging around wide, I ran to meet that blue sunrise.


End file.
